Reapplying to LSE A&F

Edinburgh Economics is a very prestigious degree course.
However, I would firm Accounting & Finance at Warwick, since you will gain exemptions from the CERTIFICATE LEVEL of the ICAEW exams i.e. INSTITUTE OF CHARTERED ACCOUNTANTS OF ENGLAND & WALES.
Take a look at the amazing success that students have with www.acamasters.com 😉
Now it is up to you, whether you want to be in Edinburgh or Leamington Spa, not far from Coventry and Birmingham but Warwick campus is truly amazing and would be one of my choices for Law if I did not get into any London universities.
You should now focus doing a Masters degree course at the LSE in 4 or 5 years time.

I'm currently in 6th year in Scotland, taking Advanced Highers in Economics, Maths, and Statistics, and I'm predicted A, A, A. I’ve received an unconditional offer from Edinburgh for Economics, and a conditional offer of A, A from Warwick for Accounting and Finance. I was rejected from LSE for Accounting and Finance, with the stated reason being my personal statement.
I wasn’t too surprised, as my personal statement was roughly 70% focused on finance, 15% on accounting, 10% on economics, and 5% on econometrics.
My extracurriculars included in the statement were: completing an online course on financial markets, attending a lecture on mathematical models of financial derivatives, work experience at an accounting firm, entering an investing competition, entering the Young Economist of the Year competition, reading a book on behavioural finance, and working as a financial columnist for my school newspaper.
I really like both the course and the location at LSE, so I’m considering reapplying with a personal statement fully tailored to their course. However, I want to make sure that if I take a gap year, it will be productive and significantly increase my chances of receiving an offer.
If anyone knows of any finance, banking, or accounting internships (ranging from a few months to a year) that are currently open for applications, or has any suggestions for other ways I could improve my application, I’d really appreciate the help. Thanks in advance.

So sorry to hear that. May I ask when you got your rejection (date and time please)

2nd April 2025, got email from LSE about 4.45pm

I'm currently in 6th year in Scotland, taking Advanced Highers in Economics, Maths, and Statistics, and I'm predicted A, A, A. I’ve received an unconditional offer from Edinburgh for Economics, and a conditional offer of A, A from Warwick for Accounting and Finance. I was rejected from LSE for Accounting and Finance, with the stated reason being my personal statement.
I wasn’t too surprised, as my personal statement was roughly 70% focused on finance, 15% on accounting, 10% on economics, and 5% on econometrics.
My extracurriculars included in the statement were: completing an online course on financial markets, attending a lecture on mathematical models of financial derivatives, work experience at an accounting firm, entering an investing competition, entering the Young Economist of the Year competition, reading a book on behavioural finance, and working as a financial columnist for my school newspaper.
I really like both the course and the location at LSE, so I’m considering reapplying with a personal statement fully tailored to their course. However, I want to make sure that if I take a gap year, it will be productive and significantly increase my chances of receiving an offer.
If anyone knows of any finance, banking, or accounting internships (ranging from a few months to a year) that are currently open for applications, or has any suggestions for other ways I could improve my application, I’d really appreciate the help. Thanks in advance.

Sorry to hear about that ☹️
Im gonna give my opinion on this without sugar coating it. I'd personally not take a gap year. Rejection from lse isn't the end of the world and you have FANTASTIC offers elsewhere . I'm saying this because if you take a gap year that means you'd have to reject your current offers and restart your application (bear in mind next year won't have the same process as we did and you may not have support with it from schools like you did this year).
When you reapply next year there's no guarantee you'll get the offer especially since accounting and finance is extremely competitive at LSE. You would have just rejected a Warwick offer. Secondly, unis like oxbridge and lse tend to prefer students applying the same year they sat their a levels. To prove yourself, you'd have to do something useful in the gap year. Work experience sure but lse seems to be more on the academic side.
As I said LSE is extremely competitive. I was part of the LSE pathways to banking and finance programme, roughly 77 a level students were on it. I've spoken to 8 of them who applied to accounting and finance and none of them got in (literally despite being in the programme and having a good PS and predicted grades, due to competition). It shows lse even rejected their current pathways aluminis simply due to sheer competition. Everyone thought this programme would increase chances of getting in.
Id say take the win. You got an UNCONDITIONAL , do you realise how difficult it is to get that , especially for economics, one of the most competitive courses. They clearly want you, they loved your application. Warwick is also wonderful as well. Both unis lead to a great career and are also top Russel group unis. I just don't think it's worth giving up an unconditional which is rare, and a Warwick offer just to reapply when you're chances are still slim.

Man if u really wanna take that gap year, focus more on reading. I just feel like 1 book on behavioural finance isn't enough since LSE loves academic PS. Read the recommended books on their website, and also studies. GL man.

Will definitely read some papers or books from the preliminary reading section, thanks for the advice

I'm a bit late here so may I ask what you ended up deciding? Did you accept one of the offers or are you reapplying?

Hiya, I ended up accepting Warwick A&F, I had talked to an Oxford Econ student who took a gap year and reapplied to lse, imperial, Oxford, ucl, and Warwick, and got into all but lse, and they advised not to take a gap year for the sole purpose of reapplying to lse a&f as there was no admissions test or other factor apart from personal statement I could improve on. I also think the difference in prestige/ranking was not large enough to warrant a year out for me personally as I hadn’t had much of a plan for what I wanted to achieve in the year apart from improve my ps. If you have any other questions I’m happy to help

Thank you very much for your reply, that makes sense. Good luck with your studies!